<!DOCTYPE html>
<html>
<head>
<meta charset="UTF-8">
<title>These are the Days When Birds Come Back by acertainslantoflight</title>
<style type="text/css">

body { background-color: #ffffff; }
.CI {
text-align:center;
margin-top:0px;
margin-bottom:0px;
padding:0px;
}
.center   {text-align: center;}
.cover    {text-align: center;}
.full     {width: 100%; }
.quarter  {width: 25%; }
.smcap    {font-variant: small-caps;}
.u        {text-decoration: underline;}
.bold     {font-weight: bold;}
</style>
</head>
<body>
<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/26406361">These are the Days When Birds Come Back</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/acertainslantoflight/pseuds/acertainslantoflight'>acertainslantoflight</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Nothing Much to Do</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Canon Compliant, Declarations Of Love, F/F, Getting Together, Girlfriends - Freeform, Peaceful vibes, pure fluff</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-09-11</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-09-11</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-06 11:42:28</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>General Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>2,096</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/26406361</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/acertainslantoflight/pseuds/acertainslantoflight</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>The beginning of summer, Hero and Ursula feel okay again.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Hero Duke/Ursula</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>2</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>6</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>These are the Days When Birds Come Back</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>This story is a headcanon I've always had and always held close to my heart, I'm so glad I finally found the words to tell it and that these characters came back to me at a time when I really needed them to help me write it. </p>
<p>Vibes collected from the album 'The Birds Outside Sang' by Florist<br/>Title from the wonderful Emily Dickinson poem of the same name </p>
<p>Hope you enjoy!</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>‘How are you feeling?’ Ursula sets down a mug of tea on Hero’s bedside table despite the warm summer air blowing through her open window and sits across from her on her bed where Ursula was glad she was spending less and less time as she recovered from…everything.</p>
<p>Hero sighs, ‘I think I’m as okay about it as I’m going to be. He seems… well, that doesn’t matter. I’m okay. She says, hugging the pillow she’s holding closer to her chest.</p>
<p>‘Good. You’re right, how he feels about you breaking up with him isn’t relevant.’ Ursula looks Hero in the eyes and thinks that if they were all she could look into for the rest of her life, she really wouldn’t mind.</p>
<p>‘Yeah, I know.’ Hero sits up straighter and Ursula’s relived to see she actually looks convinced. It had a been about two months since Hero officially broke things off with Claudio, and it took her a little bit to feel okay with it. A while for it stop feeling like an unkindness. But she was strong, she knew herself and what she deserved and what wasn’t okay and that helped her be kinder to herself than to others, for once. Ursula couldn’t help but feel proud. Except she could also feel the need for a topic change, all people had wanted to talk with Hero about for weeks had been Claudio, and she was so much more than a guy who screwed her around. If Ursula was one to raise her voice, she would have yelled at them all to open their eyes to see past that, to the wonder Hero is, to the gardens she grew within herself.</p>
<p>‘I’ve missed you, you know. Does the concept of exams not understand that I can’t cope with not being able to spend time with my incredibly perfect best friend?’</p>
<p>‘You’re too nice Ursula.’ Hero gives the tiniest of smiles.</p>
<p>‘No such thing.’ Ursula smiles along with her. If being nice to Hero was a career, she would be making millions. She needed her to know how entirely perfect she was. How much Ursula appreciated every part of her. How much she loved her. Although saying that, in that way at least, was the one thing Ursula knew she couldn’t give Hero. She couldn’t say it directly, so she said it in every other way she could think of, and hoped, maybe that would be enough.</p>
<p>‘Of course, I can’t believe I could have said such a thing.’ Hero sips her tea and looks every part the angel Bea always claims her to be and Ursula’s heart stumbles over itself, as it always does in moments such as these.</p>
<p>There is a moment of silence as they let the birds chirp outside and things feel like they’re supposed to, none of the drama, the fighting, just the world spinning and clouds passing by. ‘So I watched your last video.’ Ursula breaks the silence but it doesn’t feel like so much of a break as a re-entering of sound. ‘You’re really done with it?’</p>
<p>Hero smiles. ‘Yeah. It just felt like a lot y’know? And I don’t know if I’m really comfortable with putting my life out there for more than just my friends to see anymore… I just hope people aren’t disappointed or anything.’</p>
<p>Ursula knows this is a thought that needs to be shut down immediately. ‘No, Hero, that is so fair, okay? You don’t owe anyone anything and you just need to focus on being okay right now. That’s all anyone needs from you and it’s all anyone who watched your videos would want.’</p>
<p>Hero cradles her mug, letting the warmth and rising steam relax her. ‘Yeah…owing people. I know. Thank you.’</p>
<p>‘Of course. And it was a really cute video by the way. You know I’ve always said it but you and Bea are the most iconic cousins in the world.’</p>
<p>‘Well, of course. I am well known as the world’s best cousin.’ When Hero laughs it’s as if Ursula can feel the earth spinning under her and she thinks this really shouldn’t be the case anymore after so many years of feeling like this, but there’s something about Hero’s grasp on her heart that has had her from the start and has never let her go, not even a little bit.</p>
<p>‘Oh, obviously, I could never forget your fame and glory.’ A moment, she lets a breath of air from the window rustle her hair. ‘Wait, speaking of Bea…’</p>
<p>‘Ben?’ Hero concludes with a raised eyebrow. It was the way that sentence seemed to be always ending these days, as news of their wildly dramatic relationship spread around the school.</p>
<p>‘I still can’t believe that actually <em>worked</em>.’ Ursula thinks back to June and the plan that privately she thinks she really didn’t get enough credit for and how easy everything felt before it all felt too hard.</p>
<p>‘Really? I knew all they really needed was the tiniest push.’ Hero says and Ursula thinks about that, wonders if she pushed, just the smallest amount, not to force Hero into anything or assume that she would even want anything. Just to <em>see</em>. Just to set her tangled, hope-filled heart at peace.</p>
<p>‘If they hadn’t have made everything so complicated for themselves.’ She says.</p>
<p>‘<em>Right</em>. Why do people have to make their relationships so complex? It’s the same with Balth and Pedro. It was the same with…’ Ursula watches Hero let herself be okay with this, live up to the forgiveness she keeps urging Beatrice to give. ‘Claudio.’</p>
<p>Ursula assesses, as she does at any mention of Claudio, to see if this a ‘hug and kind words’ moment or a ‘don’t want to talk about it’ moment. The way Hero makes her chest feel just from existing in the same space as her makes Ursula think this might be more of a ‘Balth and Pedro’ situation than Hero realises, what with the adamantly not sharing how you truly feel and all. Why was the thought so terrifying? Why can’t she just do it? Except it hasn’t been long enough, only three months since Hero’s birthday. She notes how, this is once again, an excuse and wonders if she really will be forever stuck in this loop. ‘You deserve the sweetest and simplest love ever, you know that?’ Is what she settles on saying and feels the truth of it in her chest, even if Hero finds that love with someone else.</p>
<p>Hero looks at her like she’s said something entirely profound, where for Ursula, this has always been a fact of life. Hero deserves the world and she deserves it to be peaceful and kind to her. ‘Is that what you want Ursula?’ She asks and this is the closest they’ve ever gotten to talking about this and that thought causes a million others to swirl around Ursula’s head, ones she doesn’t try as hard to push away as she usually would.</p>
<p>‘Yeah, it is.’ There is something akin to the flicker of a sparkler in the air and Ursula has imagined kissing Hero many, many times, but now, the thought is almost overpowering.<em> I want it with you</em> she imagines saying and wonders if this time it would be okay.</p>
<p>‘After everything, I gave up on that being possible.’ Hero says. ‘It was hard to imagine anyone being the kind of person to give that to me.’ Another pause, another moment of birdsong and light. Ursula watches the dust in the light streaming through the window in lieu of looking at Hero, because it feels as if her heart might twist too far if she does. There is something magical about light, she thinks, it holds wonder within it. ‘But then, I would think of you, and remember that you’ve always given me that, in every moment since I met you.’ And oh, a heart cannot hold this, no further to twist, no more space to be filled.</p>
<p>Hero gives Ursula space to talk but she hardly knows what to say. She pushes her brain not to make connections that aren’t really there but there’s always that possibility that there are. ‘You make me want to give you everything Hero.’</p>
<p>Hero breathes like the air is something sweet. ‘I’ve always felt that same way about you. And I think that’s part of why what happened was a such a shock, because I couldn’t understand loving someone and not wanting them to have only good things and give them as many of those things as you could. Make them as happy as you could and have their happiness be yours.’</p>
<p>There was some kind of magic in this, some kind of light spreading through Ursula’s body and making her feel like she is becoming it, because there’s that word and she loves, loves, loves. ‘Loving someone?’</p>
<p>Hero smiles, magic spreading further. ‘Yeah, I realised some other things too.’</p>
<p>‘Oh.’ Words no longer seem like things Ursula ever knew about except Hero seems unsure of how to continue and making Hero feel okay about things was, as they had established, something Ursula had made sure she could always do. It was trickier though, when her brain felt far too busy to form a coherent thought. ‘What kind of things?’ She manages to ask.</p>
<p>‘Things like that I think you’re the most wonderful person on this planet and that I’ve actually loved you for quite a while and just didn’t know what that meant.’ She says this like it is the most important thing in the world and of course, it is. How does a room contain this kind of magic? How does a person hold this kind of feeling? The butterflies in Ursula’s stomach, rest for a moment on their flowers, at peace, for a moment.</p>
<p>‘Those kind of things.’ A butterfly flies from her and lands in the patch of light on Hero’s shoulder.</p>
<p>‘Yeah.’ Hero looks at her like she is seeing the stars for the first time. Like she is waiting for them to love her like she loves them. Ursula tries to remember all the things she has ever wanted to say to Hero and wonders how she can express them all now. It’s impossible, she knows, to express this kind of love in so few words, if there can be any words for it at all. ‘I’ve always loved you Hero. I can’t even-, you’ve always been the most perfect, most magical part of my life. I just- I love you.’ She repeats it a few times in a whisper, <em>I love you, I love you, I love you.</em> With each ‘love’, a butterfly flies from her, covering Hero with her affection, her light. And the calmness she has always tried so hard to let the both them have, feels like it has found a home in their bodies.</p>
<p>‘Oh, Ursula, I’m going to cry.’ Hero says.</p>
<p>And Ursula finally, gives herself the same kindness she has always given Hero, allows herself to do this, and not feel like she doesn’t deserve it. ‘Or you could kiss me instead?’</p>
<p>‘Yeah, that sounds like a better idea.’ Hero brushes her hair away from her face and Ursula’s heart beats like a symphony of drums and this is happening and that doesn’t feel quite real.</p>
<p>When their lips meet, the butterflies settle over both of them like a blanket, and the light spreads its warmth into their bodies through all the points where they connect, making them glow and this was a true magic, they both knew. This was the thing that was okay and was always going to be okay and was only waiting for them to catch up.</p>
<p>They part and Ursula feels herself swallowed by the look in Hero’s eyes. They smile. They laugh. They feel the happiness they have always gifted to each other and now especially, will continue to gift.</p>
<p>‘So something else I realised,’ Hero says, ‘is that I want to be your girlfriend.’ The light reaches through her eyes, her mouth.</p>
<p>‘That- yes…please’ Ursula voice is too high, or perhaps at just the right level.</p>
<p>Hero laughs, takes Ursula’s hand in hers, pulls forwards so they are both laying next to each other, amongst each other, on her bed. They close their eyes to the light, let the butterflies tickle their eyelashes, feel the other like they are oxygen, their joined hands like they are the very feeling of being held. They let the peace wrap them together and rest in their simplicity.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>A Hersula fic just felt like something the world needed right now. If you're still reading NMTD fic please come chat to me about it on tumblr here: https://www.tumblr.com/blog/tired-sunsets </p>
<p>&lt;3</p></blockquote></div></div>
</body>
</html>